x

@Grallert

……. what ya think that water "Ferris Wheel" thing was? A water ride for the kids? LOL!! : ) ……. or a water fall powered grinding mill?? : (

other observations there:

The building had one large deep basement area , but most everywhere else (class rooms,etc) there was only a 4 foot crawl space under all the first floors.

Entrance to all the crawl space areas were "sealed off" by small access panels. Big yellow warning stickers covered the access panels stating "No access permitted - Asbestos Hazard" (something to that effect and more).

Well …… of course I had to peek in there! : )

You can picture what it would normally look like for a crawl space area…. right?

Well, This was like "The Wizard of Oz" when Dorothy first opened the front door! The entire floor was covered in one foot of bright white blown-in insulation. I don't believe this was of the asbestos type because of its very white, cotton ball appearance. I'm assuming that this insulation was blown in after they removed the asbestos type as best they could, but was impossible to completely remove all the hazardous dust fibers.

……. I decided it was not a good idea to go in there! : )

@Grallert

From a google search, this looks to me like a very large first generation commercial evaporative "swamp cooler" ….. to provide cool air throughout the building.

@mattmia2

In 4th grade, I held the highly coveted job of taking the black board erasers down to the basement and run them thru a machine that would remove (clean) the chalk from them. : )

No! ………. was quite a few years ago : (

I do remember a large (4'x4') concrete duct path just above this thing.